"Go confidently in the direction of your dreams! Live the life you've imagined." ~Henry Thoreau

May 19, 2017

Friday - 2017 Garden Update

When my mom was visiting last week we did a lot of preparing to garden planting. But even with the early summer feel to the air it wasn't time to plant just yet. Her last day was Monday and she took the time before her flight left to help me move all of my starts out of the house, down the deck steps, out into the greenhouse and then completely cleaned up my living room. What a job that was, I am so thankful for her help! As she departed she mentioned that she always did love those "Friday garden updates" on the blog.

So with that intro we start into this year's garden season and a return of the garden progress each Friday.

With all of the plant starts in the greenhouse, I saw no reason not to get the cucumbers and tomatoes into their soil since the greenhouse was their last stop. So Tuesday I tilled and fertilized all of the planter boxes and slowly filled up each one. The tomatoes and cucumber plants are now all set into place. I also filled one box with parsley seed and the other with basil. Yeah for next year's pesto ingredients!

The soil in the greenhouse is so dry after freezing all winter and then drying out in the spring sun. No watering means dry and rock hard planter boxes to dig and till up by hand. The main advantage is that this type of planting doesn't involve me on my knees, yeah for that. Although a big yuck for all the black dirt I have been blowing out of my nose ever since from that dry dust, ha ha.

Also on Tuesday we received our next big step in getting the outdoor garden ready. A dump load of fresh new gardening dirt. Oh what a fun day it is when a dump truck comes to visit. The kids have talked about it ever since. And a fresh pile of soft and fertile soil. Ethan has gotten in trouble ever since because no matter what I do, I can't seem to keep him out of it. Nothing, and I mean Nothing, is more fun in his mind than that is. Josh and I look at all this nice new dirt being compacted and spread around the driveway and don't get that excited. Oh the everlasting problem of adult responsibilities vs. a child's joy and imagination. As disappointed as Ethan is, I am going to win out on this one though! That dirt is next fall's vegetables. Someday he will understand. I will just have to put "taking Ethan to sand dunes for reckless jumping" on the family to do list for his childhood.

And this is a picture of this year's garden as of last night. If you have followed the blog for long you know we are expanding the garden this year. Adding about 1/2 as much more area to plant in. Last fall Josh pulled all the fence out in preparation. He also cut and removed as much of the grass sod as he could from the area in front of the preexisting garden. Now that we are into the replanting mode he has spent the early part of the week building up the retaining wall another railroad tie higher. On Wednesday I laid a thick layer of newspaper and thin layer of dirt all over the new growing area. We find the paper helps keep weeds down and also composts over the years. With this pregnant belly of mine the work went very slow and took all day. Yet my little bit of progress did mean that Josh could come home to ground ready to be covered and filled in. The past few nights have seen Josh throwing shovel full of dirt up into the garden and pushing huge wheel barrow loads up and in over and over and over again. I know he is out there just wishing he had heavy machinery that could do the job in seconds.

The plan for tonight and this weekend is intense but if I share it all now what joy will anyone find in next Friday's garden update?? The baby is coming soon - our 2017 garden is top priority around here!

2 comments:

mother
said...

Good pic of those 3 enthralled little ones watching the dump truck. Abigail peering above the rail, Naomi through the wire and poor Ethan is just in between and has to bend or stretch. How that will change next year. The cucumbers look sad and the garden sooo empty but that will change soon enough. Glad you'll do Friday updates.